First Kiss
by Kiana Maria
Summary: Malibu, California, 1998. Shannon is fourteen and Boone is sixteen. Their parents go away for a weekend, leaving the kids to their own devices.
1. Friday

"God, Shannon, wake up."

Shannon opened her eyes. The light was bright and everyone was filing out of the room. The last buzz of the three o'clock bell diminished in the air.

Ashley poked her again. Shannon sat up straight and gathered her books. She pulled her purse off the back of her desk and stood up.

"You're so weirdly sleepy all the time," Ashley said, as she and Shannon walked into the hall.

"I know. I just...I don't know."

"Is your brother driving you home?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Well, I have student council, so..."

"I'll call you."

She pushed open an outside door and stepped into the sun. The school lawn was crowded as she crossed the grass to the parking lot. She dug her sunglasses out of her purse and slid them onto her face.

Boone's Mustang was parked near the field. Shannon walked to it, glanced inside and found it empty. She leaned back against its hot metal trunk.

"Hey, Shannon!"

Looking to one side, she saw Nicole Schmidt jogging toward her. "Where's Boone?"

"I dunno."

"Will you give him this?" She stuck a folded sheet of paper into Shannon's hand. "Don't read it, okay?"

"Okay."

Nicole jogged away. Shannon watched until she had disappeared and then unfolded the note. _I had such a good time after the game...CALL ME! Nicole._ A sudden gust of wind blew the paper out of her hand, and she watched it fly across the parking lot.

"God, where have you been?" she asked, when the parking lot was almost empty and she finally saw Boone walking toward her.

"I was making out with Amber Lee."

"Are you kidding?" she said, as he unlocked the car and sat down inside. "Where?" She sat into the car and pulled closed her door. "Where?" she asked again.

"Behind the gym." He started the motor.

"Oh, my God."

She popped open the glove compartment and found her inhaler.

"You're supposed to keep that in your purse," Boone said. "What if you need it?"

She closed her eyes and breathed in her medicine. "Well, what if I don't?"

As he drove out of the parking lot Shannon fiddled with the radio.

"I'm not listening to the Spice Girls," he said. "Change it."

"It's Celine Dion."

"Oh, that's so much better." He changed the station and turned left, onto the Pacific Coast Highway. Shannon rolled down her window and felt the ocean breeze.

When he turned into their driveway, they saw Sabrina outside, carrying a suitcase. She saw them and pointed with one hand, mouthing words. Boone parked behind the Jeep.

"I said not to park there," Sabrina said, as Shannon and Boone left the car.

"Why? What's going on?" said Boone.

"Just go ask Adam."

Shannon carried her books and her purse and her inhaler down the driveway and stepped inside the kitchen door. Her father walked in from the media room, a suitcase in one hand.

"Are you going somewhere?" Shannon asked.

"Your grandmother's having another one of her crises."

"You're both going?" said Boone, as Sabrina stepped in the back door.

"Your mother believes that if she doesn't accompany me I'm going to have an extramarital affair."

Sabrina put her hands on her hips. "Why did you say that?" she began. "Why did you say that in front of them? You're just trying to make me look like..."

Shannon left the room and put her things down on a table. She found the remote and turned on the TV. Her father was talking to Boone. "Don't go anywhere, and don't have anybody over. Mamie will be here tomorrow. Keep your eye on Shannon. If you go swimming, be careful."

"When are you coming back?" Shannon asked, looking into the other room.

"I guess it depends," her father said. He walked to her, put his hands on her shoulders and lightly kissed her forehead. "Be good."

"Adam," Sabrina shouted from the kitchen, "come on."

Her father picked up his suitcase.

"Boone, move your car," said Sabrina. The three of them walked through the back door.

Shannon sat down on the couch and grabbed her purse from the table. She dug out her phone and flipped it open while a sitcom family laughed on TV. She closed it again and heard Boone come in the back door.

"Are they gone?" she asked, as he walked into the room.

"Mm-hmm."

Boone's phone rang, and he pulled it out of his pocket. He left the room, talking, and Shannon slipped off her shoes and lay her head on a pillow.

* * *

"Wake up."

Someone poked her shoulder and she opened her eyes. "Wake up," he said again.

"Where's my dad?"

"They left, remember?" Boone said.

"Oh. Okay...what time is it?"

"Eight o'clock."

"In the morning?"

"Are you serious?"

She found her phone in the cushions and flipped it open. **8:15pm, Friday September 25.** The smell of popcorn and other microwavable delights drifted in from the kitchen.

Shannon stood and stretched. She walked down the hall to the bathroom. She peed into the toilet, flushed and washed her hands and face. Back in the kitchen, Boone was flipping closed his phone.

"Who were you talking to?"

"Amber," he said, digging one hand into the popcorn.

Shannon got a soda out of the fridge and opened the microwave. Half a plate of veggie burritos sat inside. She picked up the plate and ate with her hands.

"Do you ever think about how weird it is that you sleep so much?" Boone asked.

"I can't help it."

"Don't talk with your mouth full."

She swallowed her bite. "Well, you asked me."

His phone rang again, he stood up and answered it while leaving the room.

Shannon put her empty plate in the sink and went back to the media room, found her phone and turned off the TV. She climbed the stairs to her bedroom, opened the window and lay down. She dialed Ashley's number, and talked while the ocean waves lulled her back to sleep.


	2. Saturday

Shannon lay one hand on the rail in the upstairs hall. She wore a black leotard, pink tights and ballet slippers. A CD of classical music played from her room, and the roar of a vacuum cleaner rose up the stairs.

" _Jete,_ one-two-three," she said in her mind as she did the movements, " _grande battement_ and down, _plie._ "

She kicked one leg into the air and held the position as long as she could. She looked at her thigh, her knee, her shin, her ankle, and her foot. Some muscle definition showed through her pink tights. "Protein, girls, protein," her ballet teacher always said. Shannon wondered: Do I want to be muscle-y workout girl, like in that tampon commercial? Or skinny vulnerable girl? I can't believe people actually like those girls on the soccer team, with the fat butts... When her leg began to tremble, she held the position for a few more counts, and then released it, lowering her leg to the floor and relaxing her entire body.

She walked downstairs, into the living room, and saw Mamie unplug the vacuum. A bottle of Windex and a feather duster sat on one table. "So tall," Mamie said, wrapping the cord around the vacuum. "How tall are you now?"

"I don't know. 5'8 or 5'9." She walked down the hall to the kitchen and saw Boone sitting at the table with his phone. "Mamie needs a grocery list," he said.

Shannon went to Sabrina's desk and found a pad of pink paper and a gold-colored pen. _Don't use my stationary. Just don't use anything on this desk._ "Well, you're not here, are you?" Shannon muttered to herself. She thought a minute before she wrote:

 _peanut butter and jelly in the same jar_

 _white bread_

 _milk_

 _chocolate milk_

 _some kind of Little Debbies_

 _6-pack of cherry Coke_

 _6 frozen pizzas_

 _microwave popcorn_

 _pretzels_

 _Seventeen magazine_

 _People magazine_

She ripped the paper off the pad as Boone's phone rang.

"Which Nicole?" he asked into the phone, smiling. Shannon went to the table and laid the grocery list near his hand. She went through the doorway to the media room and heard him say, "Shannon, this is all junk food." She found the remote and switched on the TV.

When a commercial came on, she glanced up to see Boone by her side. "I told Mamie to get some vegetables."

"Vegetables. Okay, whatever."

"Listen," he said, "I'm going to meet Nicole at the Country Mart."

"My dad said not to go anywhere."

"Yeah, like I really care." He left the room, and Shannon turned back to the TV. "Nicole's a bitch, you know," she called after him, as she heard the back door open and close.

* * *

Mamie had returned, stocked the kitchen and gone. Shannon stood in her bedroom, pulling off her ballet shoes. She peeled off her leotard and tights and left them in a pile on the floor.

Her sweatpants and T-shirt were as soft and comfy as the newly-washed sheets she lay down in. She flipped open her phone and dialed Boone's number. He didn't answer and didn't answer, and so she hung up and called Ashley. When she heard Ashley's I'm-not-here message she remembered that she had track and field.

She went down to the kitchen. _People_ and _Seventeen_ lay neatly on the counter. She put a pizza in the oven and opened a bag of pretzels while she paged through the magazines.

When her phone rang in the distance, she ran upstairs to find it. She flipped it open and said hello.

"Hey, Shannon," her father's voice said, "is everything going all right?"

"Yeah...well, I don't know where Boone is, but..." She walked down the hall and descended the stairs.

"Well, it looks like we'll be home tomorrow night," he said. "So don't forget your homework."

"I won't forget," she said, walking into the kitchen.

"Well, sometimes you fall asleep and you -"

"How's Grandma?"

"Oh, you know, she thinks it's 1933 and she's in Paris, but, you know..."

"Adam, get off the phone," Sabrina's voice said.

"Well, looks like I have to go."

"Oh, 'cause Sabrina said so?"

"Look, Shannon...we'll be home tomorrow, okay?"

She hung up the phone.

The oven beeped and she found the potholder. She pulled out the pizza and set it on the counter. She pulled open a drawer, saw the pizza cutter, and closed the drawer again. She pulled the pizza apart with her hands, and ate while leaning onto the counter, reading about fall fashions and Keri Russell's hair and Bill Clinton's indiscretions.

* * *

An hour later, another pizza had been devoured, as well as three sodas and the whole bag of pretzels. Little Debbie wrappers lay empty all over the room.

She went upstairs, through Sabrina's master bedroom suite to the private bathroom. She burped loudly, and then looked around, as if anyone had heard in the empty house.

She lifted the toilet seat and then washed her hands with perfume-scented soap. She kneeled down onto the floor. She stuck two fingers into her mouth, pushing back until she felt whatever that thing in the back of your throat was called. Her stomach convulsed and she gagged. She tried again, and again, until vomit poured out of her mouth.

She sat back and leaned against the wall. She was sweating and shaking. Sabrina's full-length mirror stood in the corner. Shannon looked into it, and watched herself cry.


	3. Sunday

Shannon sat at the table in her father's study, her French book open and a pen in her hand. A Goo Goo Dolls CD played out of the speakers.

Her phone rang, and she flipped it open.

"Oh my God," said Ashley's voice, before she could say hello. "Yesterday, at track and field, I was talking to Tim Jordan - well, we were basically like talking all day, like we were just hanging out together all day - and then he asked for my number, and then today he just called me and asked me out."

"Oh my God, are you serious?" Shannon exclaimed. "Are you serious? Tim Jordan asked you out?"

"We were just like talking, for like a long time, and then he was like, 'We should go out sometime.'"

"Oh my God. But he was going out with Amanda -"

"They broke up," Ashley said.

"Oh my God."

Suddenly, Shannon's phone was snatched from her hand. "Hello, Ashley?" Boone said, walking to the CD player and turning off the music. "Shannon can't talk until she finishes her homework."

"Oh my God, give me that." Shannon jumped from her chair and tried to grab the phone as Boone squeezed it shut. He held the phone over her head. "You can have -"

"Give it to me!"

"You can have it back when you finish your homework."

He left the room and she collapsed back into her chair.

She glanced at her French book and then stomped into the kitchen. Boone was at the table. "You know, it's really not easy for me to maintain friendships, and then you just -"

"'Maintain friendships,'" he smirked. "Where did you hear that? Oprah?"

She rushed to the counter, and her hands scrambled around for her inhaler.

"Oh yeah, make a big deal about it now," Boone said, as she closed her eyes and breathed. "When it's convenient for you to act like a victim."

"I hate you."

She ran up the stairs and slammed her door.

* * *

An hour later, Shannon walked down the stairs, wearing a bikini and flip-flops, a towel draped over her shoulder.

"Where are you going?" Boone asked, as she walked past him in the hall.

"Where does it look like I'm going?"

She walked out the back door. The sun burned her shoulders and blinded her eyes. When the green grass turned into hot sand, she spread out her towel and shook off her sandals. She looked around the empty beach. Far away, a man played frisbee with his dog. She sprinted across the burning sand to the ocean.

She walked into the surf, and let the foamy waves throw her up and down. She closed her eyes, and a splash of water soaked her face and hair.

When she left the water, she saw Boone sitting near her towel. She hurried back across the hot sand.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, picking up her towel to dry her face. Her feet found her flip-flops. "Do you think I need a babysitter?"

"Look, Shannon," he said. "Sit down."

"Why?"

"Just sit."

She dropped her towel to the ground and sat beside him.

"I'm sorry about...fighting," he said. "It's just that -"

"It's just that you think you have to tell me every little thing to do, 'cause you don't think I'm capable of-"

"That's not it."

They looked out to the horizon. Pelicans dove into the ocean and seagulls called in the sky.

"It's just," he continued, "I don't want you to be one of those ditzy girls who only cares about clothes and guys."

"Oh my God," she laughed. "Look who's talking. Clothes and _girls."_

"I'm serious." He thought. "You need some survival skills. You don't have...you know, your mom."

"Well, you can't miss someone you've never met."

"Yeah, you can," he said. "We were talking about it in psychology. There was this case study about this girl just like you."

"Maybe if _your_ mom wasn't such a _bitch_ to me all the time -"

"I know," he said. "It's the stepmother complex. And you resent your dad for marrying her."

She bent her knees, pulling her legs into her chest. A pink and white seashell poked out of the sand.

"What would happen if I just walked into the water?" she asked. "What if I just kept walking, and never came back?"

Boone's arm circled her shoulders. "It's all right," he whispered. "We have each other."

He rubbed her back. She turned to look at him. He looked into her eyes. He put one hand on her face, and rubbed her chin with his thumb.

Their lips came together, and then they pulled away. They looked at each other. And then they kissed again, their tongues moving in and out of each other's mouths. It was soft and warm and wet.

"Well," he said, when it was over. "I guess-"

"Let's just not talk." She laid her head on his shoulder, and they watched the waves crash onto the shore.


End file.
